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Today I’m going to talk about White Balance, a term which may not be familiar to many of you. White Balance is essentially the color temperature in any picture, and most cameras provide some sort of functionality to control the White Balance in your shot. Because the camera sees differently than our eyes, it is sometimes important to “trick” the camera into capturing how you want color to appear in your photo. Below are some of the most common White Balance settings, with a brief description about when to use them.

Auto (AWB). The Auto White Balance (AWB) setting tells the camera to set the white balance for you automatically. This is a good place to start; if the photo turns out well in your preview, then there is probably no need to further adjust the white balance. But this setting can be hit or miss, so you may have to try another option.

Tungsten. If there is a lot of red or orange in the scene, the Tungsten setting (usually a light bulb icon) adds blue to the photo to compensate. Regular (tungsten) light bulbs give off an orange tint, so this is a good setting to use indoors when photographing under incandescent lights.

Fluorescent. The Fluorescent setting (usually a fluorescent bulb icon) adds magenta into the photo to compensate for the green tint given off by most fluorescent light bulbs. Use this setting indoors under fluorescent lights.

Cloudy. The Cloudy setting (usually a cloud icon) warms the photo up by adding orange to compensate for the blue tint given off by clouds. Use this setting when photographing outdoors in cloudy or overcast situations.

Shade. The Shade setting adds even more orange than the Cloudy setting to warm up a photo taken outside in the shade.

Two other White Balance settings you may find on your camera are:

Daylight. Use this setting when shooting outdoors in a sunny situation. Chances are the AWB setting will produce very similar results, so you can probably use either one.

Flash. The Flash setting is best when you set up an external flash (a flash not built into your camera). Without setting your camera to the Flash mode, the entire photo will turn blue when using an external flash. Your regular built-in flash does not require you to use this setting; the camera will automatically adjust accordingly.

Color Temperature. Cameras also measure color temperature. Your camera may allow you to set the color temperature, measured in degree units of Kelvin. This is a bit more advanced, but if you choose to give it a try, just remember that the higher the Kelvin number is, the warmer (more orange) the photo will be, and the lower the number is, the colder (more blue) the photo will be. For example, the Shade setting (which adds orange) takes a photo at about 7000 degrees Kelvin, while the Tungsten setting (which adds blue) takes a photo at about 3200 degrees Kelvin. Pure white is 5200 degrees Kelvin. If you do have the ability to set the color temperature, it is fun to intentionally manipulate a photo. For instance, an already warm sunset shot could be more fantastic if made even warmer by increasing the color temperature. Play around and have fun!

And the winner is…

I recently invited you all to submit your best Fourth of July photo for our Fourth of July Photo contest. All I can say is WOW! You all truly did an amazing job! I saw some incredible photos, and picking just one winner was very hard. Bravo to all of you, and thank you for participating.
The winner is Alexandro Jimenez Viveros, who submitted this fantastic fireworks shot taken on the Fourth of July at Minute Maid Park in Houston, TX. Alexandro set his Nikon D50 on Manual Mode, and set the Aperture to f/3.5, and the shutter speed to 3″ seconds at ISO 200. By keeping his ISO low, he was able to capture this fun shot with very little grain or digital noise. Fireworks shots are always more interesting when you include something of your surroundings. Great job Alexandro! Enjoy the iPod!
We also wanted to include some runner up photos. Two of our finalists (Shelly Laessig and Anonymous) utilized our Sparkler Sky Writing tips and captured these two striking images. We also had another fantastic fireworks image (George Oehl). Again, by placing the surrounding scene in the shot, the photo turned out amazing. Our final runner up (Ellis) featured a very cute shot of a little one testing out the pinwheels. Great Americana shot, and great framing.
Thanks again to everyone who participated! We will do another contest sometime soon. See you next time!